


FortePiano

by Im_All_Teeth



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Canon Compliant, F/M, Hogwarts, Music, Oneshot, Piano, Sad, Tags Are Hard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-07
Updated: 2018-07-07
Packaged: 2019-06-06 13:28:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,986
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15195764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Im_All_Teeth/pseuds/Im_All_Teeth
Summary: "He actually didn't like having to sit down at the bench and memorize songs, notes, chords, but he loved the satisfaction he felt when music was played well and there was rarely anyone around who could play piano better than he could." One shot. Dramione. Canon-compliant (which means it's sad).





	FortePiano

He played the piano like a quick fuck with a girl he loved so much he hated her.

He actually didn't like having to sit down at the bench and memorize songs, notes, chords, but he loved the satisfaction he felt when music was played  _well_  and there was rarely anyone around who could play piano better than he could. There had always been a smooth black piano in his house. His father had purchased it years before he was born, even though no one in his family played at all before Draco.

At the tender age of four, Lucius had signed him up for piano lessons with a hook-nosed old man who had scared him. Draco had cried, hid, and kicked to escape the weekly lessons, but his father was a stubborn man with a heavy hand and very little remorse, so for seven years, he never missed a lesson.

From the very beginning, even when he was only hitting at notes brokenly, his father would sit in a high-backed chair with his eyes closed and simply listen to Draco practice. He did not smile or give any other sign of approval, but every so often, he would stand behind Draco and watch his small son's fingers trace the keys. Once, Lucius had put a large hand on his shoulder. He winced, but his father had only said, "Even if you are sad, you'll always have the piano," But he didn't say it like he was talking to Draco. It was like he was talking to someone who only lived inside his head these days.

At first, he hated the piano because his father loved it. After seven years, he hated the piano because he wasn't sure what he would do without it.

When he first arrived at Hogwarts, he found a great black monster in a dark room in the dungeons after weeks of searching. Its keys were yellow and brown with dust and it needed tuning, but Draco didn't care. He cleaned it out and straightened it up and then he sat down and began to play. He didn't play for his father or some demented sense of homesickness, he played because it was a habit to play and because he didn't know what else to do.

In the winter of his fourth year, Pansy Parkinson was his first everything. In that empty room, they fumbled curious and awkward around their bodies with only the piano watching. Pansy had done things before, with Adrian Pucey, but it was the first time either of them had had actual sex. Afterward, when they were laying sweaty and mostly naked together on the floor, he was sure that he loved her and that they would be together forever. So he pulled back the bench and played the piano for her while she pulled her knickers and skirt back on over her socks. He played all the hope he had for their future and even a little bit about the children he wanted to have with her someday. He played her everything about how he was scared of his father and how he always secretly worried his mother didn't want him. Mostly, though, he played how happy he was they had each other.

"That was beautiful," she had said when he finished, "But have you seen my tie?"

He knew then she did not love him and so he could never love her, either. This truth made him so sad that he forgot how to breathe.

He stayed with Pansy for the better part of a year after that but never played the piano for her ever again, and she never asked him to. In the fall of his fifth year, he exchanged her for the gorgeous and odd Daphne Greengrass. "You have lovely hands," she had told him on the train ride to school, "They're thin but capable." He had laughed about this with his friends—Daphne was always saying weird things like that—but secretly, he loved that someone had noticed his hands. It made him want to show her more things that she could love about him.

Pansy had screamed and thrown things at him when she learned that he was dating Daphne. "Have fun," she spat bitterly, her eyes filled with tears and fury, "Hear she's a good  _shag_ , but she'll never love you like I did."

But Draco did not care about these antics because he did not love Pansy and he knew that Pansy only loved how rich he was.

Pansy was right about Daphne: She had been a great shag, with unending legs and mouth that could do things he had never even fantasized. Their relationship, though, was almost exclusively physical, which was for the best. Daphne said strange things and drew beautiful and sad pictures, mostly of birds and trees, but she never really loved anyone, not even herself.

"Sometimes I just want to disappear. You know, just get smaller and smaller and then vanish entirely," she had said one night while they were laying together in Draco's bed. The words had come seemingly from nowhere during a moment of sweaty satisfaction, at least on Draco's end.

"I don't want you to disappear," he had replied as kindly as he could, but she only laughed hollowly, and rolled as far across the bed as she could. He felt cold where her body had pressed against his.

"You'd forget about me before I was even completely gone, but what you want doesn't matter to me, anyway," she had said.

Draco knew that this should hurt to hear, but it didn't. It fascinated him, actually, how someone could say something so angry without yelling. That year, when he played the piano, he played mostly about her, but he never played  _for_  her. As far as she knew, his lovely, thin, capable hands were for many things, but not for the piano. Never for the piano.

In the summer before his sixth year, he could not seem to play anything right. Maybe it was because his father was in prison and that absence left a hole in life at the Manor. Maybe it was because the walls now crawled with Death Eaters and as much as he feared and respected the Dark Lord and the others, the air was suffocating wherever they went. Maybe it was because his left arm now hurt constantly and so his fingers couldn't move fast enough over the keys. Whatever the reason, the piano always sounded forced. It was still beautiful, but in a halting, choked way.

When he went back to Hogwarts, he returned to his piano (because it had to be his; a piano had to belong to somebody and whose else could it be?). Suddenly he could not play it enough, and he drummed his fingers against his legs in imaginary melodies under his desk in class. He dreamed about playing the piano. While he was fixing that damned cabinet, he hummed imaginary tunes to himself.

He was together with Pansy again, but there was no tenderness in their romance this time. Mostly, it was rough sex in deserted hallways, with snarls on their faces and their clothes still on. It felt like she only wanted to hurt him, and he only wanted to make someone else pay for a change.

When he played the piano this year it was all crashing chords and the angry notes that shook the walls. He liked to think that it sounded like destruction. He liked to think he was playing the castle walls down, brick by brick.

In the winter, though, when he had heard that his plan for the enchanted necklace had failed and the girl had been hurt, he wanted to apologize but he did not know how to say anything except on the piano. So he played her a sad sonata that he made up as he went along. He told her that he was sorry for hexing her and he was sorry that she had gotten hurt. He even apologized to Dumbledore for what he would eventually do although he was less sorry about that than he was about everything else. He was so focused on making a perfect apology that he didn't notice he was being watched until he slumped back on the stool with a sigh, spent, his hands dead in his lap.

Someone behind him sniffed loudly in the doorway and he whirled to see Hermione Granger wiping her sleeve across her eyes. Noting that she was unarmed and not even looking at him, he tucked his wand back into his robes and eyed her imperiously, daring her to say something, the filthy girl.

But she did not say anything. She simply stood there and cried with little hiccuping sobs. Draco did not know how to react to this and so he sat on the bench, watching her cautiously. When she had finally calmed down, she looked at him with eyes that were wide with honesty. "I didn't know you could play the piano like that," she said simply. Then, "Oh," she gasped and brought a hand to her mouth, as if only just realizing who she was talking to, "I'm sorry for eavesdropping, only I was doing patrols you know and," she stopped awkwardly, "I'll just go."

Before he could respond, she had turned and sprinted from the door. By the time he had stumbled from the bench to look after her, the last echoes of her running footsteps were fading and the girl was gone.

For a week after this, he remembered to lock the door before he sat down to play the piano, but he had too much on his mind to remember this triviality forever. By late November, Hermione Granger had wandered down to his piano room again, and she was impossible to keep out.

She said, "You played the piano like you were angry at it." She was wearing a frown on her dark features.

"And what would  _you_  know about it, mudblood?" he sneered, hiding behind the knowledge that he was better than her and that was all that mattered.

He could have sworn that she physically got bigger at this, her hair expanding in indignation. She stalked toward him and for a moment, he worried that she would hit him again. Her hands shot toward him and he instinctively covered his face, but she reached farther than him and hit the piano instead.

She played a minuet he didn't recognize and she played it so softly and quickly he had to stop moving to catch it. The message was unmistakable.  _I'm sorry you're unhappy, but don't take it out on me, because I have not hurt you_ , she played. She used three chords in the highest octave because it was the only one she could reach and he noticed how the tips of her fingers were stained indigo with ink. He glanced up at her face, and she stared lovingly at the piano.

"There." She humphed when she had finished, "I've been playing the piano since I was little and I know what I'm doing, so don't you dare bring your blood-purity rubbish into this." With that, she turned primly and marched out of the room with her nose in the air. He hadn't known that muggles had pianos.

Once her footsteps had faded, he stared down at the keys and murmured a cleaning spell before he touched it.

He went back to his room thinking about Granger's piece and was still thinking about it the next day, and so when he sat at the piano bench that evening, he played a response to it, utilizing the same three chords but much lower. He kept stopping in the middle, waiting for her to appear. But she did not come, and a little after midnight, he left the room feeling oddly disappointed.

She did not reappear for several days, but when she did, he was ready for her. As soon as he heard her soft footsteps across the floor (he hadn't realized he had been listening for them), he turned and looked pointedly at her before launching into the response- a fugue he began composing after her last visit. When he finished, he turned to see her reaction, and she was smiling grimly. She brought her hands together in quiet applause and he felt a wave of pride wash over him. No one had ever applauded his music before. For a moment, he did not care that she was a mudblood, or that she was Potter's best friend, or even that he was a Death Eater; he was simply proud that he had made something that someone else had liked and he loved that she had liked it.

She walked toward him. "Move over." She grinned, and he silently complied, gathering his robes so that they would not touch her (because no matter how much she might love the piano, she was still dirty and he did not want to touch her). A small frown registered the gap he placed between them, but then she launched into a new tune, something sadder than the last one she had played for him, but still optimistic. After a few lines, he joined her on the keys, his hands racing over the lower notes, darkening the melody. The song they played was something that was at once hopeful and bitter. The harmonies they played were frustratingly discordant, but there was still something brilliant about the way they disagreed.

After a dozen or so measures, she stopped and looked at him, disapproval on her features. "You still play like you're angry at everything."

"And you play like everything is perfect," he shot back. "Honestly, Granger, I can hardly hear you."

"That's because you play so loud!" she snapped and ran her fingers over the keys. They fell into an unhappy silence and then Granger stood abruptly. "I should go," she said flatly.

"See you tomorrow," He drawled, trying not to sound hopeful but watching her face closely.

She glared back at him. Then she nodded curtly.

He was glad she didn't say anything. If she had, he would have been forced to say something scathing and he found he didn't really want to do that. He was too happy to have found someone else who knew how to play the piano to want to chase her away.

The next day, he could hear someone playing the piano before he even entered the room, and when he did, he found Hermione playing something Christmas-y. She looked up at him as he entered, and he noticed her eyes warily searching him. He made a show of stowing his wand inside his robes and sat down on the bench beside her.

"Something's different about you," Pansy complained over dinner one night, glaring. He shrugged and then talked to Blaise about Potions. He didn't really care about either of them. His mind was filled with the music he wanted to play. Granger still insisted he played too loudly, and he still believed she didn't put enough conviction into her notes.

"Reckless," she had called him.

"Cowardly," he had replied.

"You're rushing along like you don't care what happens to anyone," she accused.

"And you're afraid to do anything unexpected."

There were some nights when he had too much work to get down to the piano room, and there other nights when Hermione didn't show up, but more nights than not, they played together for hours, chasing each other up and down the keyboard, challenging tempos and throwing sharps and flats like insults.

Late December brought vacation and he returned to his parents' house. He hated being back there. He did not play the piano once the entire break even though he thought about it all the time; the piano did not sound like it was built for one voice anymore.

When he returned to school in January, his first thought was of the piano room. Hermione did not return until three nights after the term had resumed. He had fretted terribly. At first, he had worried something terrible had happened to her over vacation and he had looked desperately for her across the great hall at breakfast. When he saw her smiling and laughing with her friends, he was both relieved and insulted. Did this mean that Little Miss Muddy would no longer deign to play the piano with him? Well, fine. To hell with her, then. And he resolved not to think about her anymore.

But he did think about her.

For two more nights, he slammed angrily against the keys, louder and more feckless than ever. On the third night, though, as he was pounding out a particularly biting crescendo, he felt a cool hand pulling his away from the notes. He looked up to see Hermione's face distorted in a grimace above him.

"I'm sorry I didn't come back sooner but you don't need to get so worked up about it," she chided gently.

He closed his hand around her fingers, his eyes glued to the keyboard.

"I missed you," he said quietly and he felt the delicate pressure of her fingers squeezing his.

"I missed you, too."

In late January, Pansy thumped her cup of tea into its saucer, sloshing liquid over the sides. "What on earth is wrong with you, Draco?" she demanded, her eyes flashing dangerously. "Is it some other girl? Tell me—What's the bint's name?"

He sipped his coffee calmly and didn't bother to respond.

The next day, he broke up with Pansy Parkinson for the second and last time while they were doing homework together in the common room.

"Well, this time the joke's on you, Malfoy," she had sneered, "I've been screwing Nott for weeks."

He turned back to his potions essay and didn't bother to respond. What was there to say?

February came. He and Hermione vyed for control of tempo and for the first time in his life, he let someone else win. Hermione liked quick melodies and she enjoyed setting the pace, and so after putting up a small struggle (so it looked like he was trying), he would give her control just to see the smile it would put on her face.

"I passed my apparition test!" she announced proudly one Monday evening, beaming at him as they settled on the bench.

"I'm proud of you," he replied and meant it.

She leaned against him briefly and his heart sped up. Without thinking, he kissed her on the top of the bushy head.

On the first day of March, Hermione didn't show up. On the second day of March, she arrived looked pale and worn out.

"Ron's been poisoned," she said, and her eyes filled with tears. He knew who had poisoned Ron but couldn't say he was sorry that Weasel had gotten the potion meant for Dumbledore. He was only sorry that it hadn't killed him. He said nothing, only held Hermione against his chest while she shook with quiet sobs and secretly hated Ronald Weasely and Harry Potter.

When she had hiccuped herself back under control, she looked at the keys of the piano glumly and said, "I can't come here anymore."

He had expected this but was not prepared for the way it made something empty out inside of him. "I know," he said, but he was still holding her to him. _Just a moment longer_ , he thought, _just one more moment and maybe it will be enough_.

Finally, Hermione straightened up. "Well, goodbye," she said quietly, and his arm fell to her fingers, which he grasped briefly. Standing behind the bench, looking sadly into his face and still holding his hand, "I love you," she added, almost as a quick and quiet afterthought.

"I know," he replied again and dropped his hand to his side. After she had gone, he stared at the piano but did not play.

For the rest of March, he was sure he was going mad. His mind was always filled with music—beautiful duets, contemplative sonatas, brooding fugues—but he could not bring himself to return to the piano room. While this gave him ample time to work on the cabinet, he hardly slept and ate even less.

April passed in a similar blur and by the time spring had come to the castle, he was on his last nerve. One evening he glanced across the dining hall and happened to spot Hermione staring at the Weasel with adoring eyes and Draco broke. He excused himself and staggered away to find somewhere private, but certainly not the piano room. Potter followed him, though, and made some very accurate accusations that he was not paying attention to. The only thought that chased itself around his head was that  _this is the reason why I cannot play the piano anymore_. So he threw a curse at Potter, who parried with one he had never heard before. While bleeding out on the bathroom floor, staring at the ceiling, he realized that for the first time in months, his mind was quiet.

He wished Snape had just let him die on the floor, but life is never so kind.

When he thought about the months that followed, he did not want to imagine what Hermione's reactions would have been. They were always truthful, and so he could only see her mouth a gash of sadness when she learned of his betrayal. She would doubtlessly be furious when she learned what he had done to mudbloods like her ( _but not like her at all_ , he thought). His cowardice would have appalled her.

Summer didn't matter, fall didn't matter, and winter didn't matter. He could not play the piano, even though waltzes and minuets ran endlessly through his mind. He hated Hermione for not coming back to school and he hated her for being muggle-born in the first place and he hated how he never missed her any less. Mostly, though, he hated that he could not play the piano anymore, because even when he tried to, it only sounded half-finished.

In the spring, Hermione's screams rang like a requiem through his house. After she escaped with her friends, he sat down at the piano and for the first time in almost a year, he played. He played softly, apologetically, as if playing the way she had always liked would make everything alright again, but when that didn't help, he played louder and angrier until he was hurling his hands flat against the keys, playing nothing but noise, and still, he was not satisfied.

He married Astoria Greengrass, who was nothing like her older sister but who he liked even less. Astoria was cold and did not even have enough depth to muster hatred for her apathetic spouse. She was obviously puzzled by his secret love of the piano but did not question him, just as he did not question her on the nights she stumbled home, smelling like cheap sex.

He is old now—he knows it—and although his own son plays the piano as well as he does, they do not understand each other. Scorpius plays wild, hitting the wrong notes as often as right ones, and he does not care because he thinks just the sound is beautiful. He alternately beats and caresses the keys based on his mood and he is too capricious for his father's taste.

Astoria is gone, but Draco doesn't notice the absence. He is too busy crashing against the piano; playing the howl of a broken heart and a loneliness that words cannot reach.

He plays the piano like a quick fuck too long imagined with a girl he has loved for so long that loving her and hating her are indistinguishable habit, and as much a part of him as sleeping or forgetting to breathe.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading.  
> Originally posted on fanfiction.net on 01/08/11. This entire thing was inspired by the beautiful and talented Abigail-Nicole's Piano, which can be found at https://www.fanfiction.net/s/2014074/1/Piano  
> Stay warm.


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